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DenaMarie
I am a Director of a day care center/ preschool. We have 125 children enrolled, about 1/4 of them come from homes where spanish is the only language spoken. My experience in the Early Childhood Field has been that it is best for the children to hear both languages from the start, if possible.
I have 18 full time employees. Only 2 of them speak spanish so when a spanish speaking parent enrolls a child it is not likely that they will be in a classroom with a teacher/caregiver who can speak spanish. So the children hear english spoken all day long and then spanish when they return home. I have found that the younger the child when they start, the better they pick up the 2 languages. Our parents who speak spanish only are amazed at how fast their child picks up the english language. As they grow they learn to understand and speak both!
The woman who is the 2-3 year old preschool teacher at our center has a son who has been in our center since she returned to work when he was 6 weeks old. They speak only spanish at home. From the beginning he has heard both languages. He is now 2 and knows many, many words in both languages. Sometimes he will even forget that his teacher can only speak english. He will say something in spanish and she will ask him to repeat it in english, and he will!
All that said, It sounds like you are doing a great job with your child. It is wonderful to be able to speak more than 1 language.
God Bless
Judilyn
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